jeudi 6 novembre 2014

Animals that don't Exist

The Addicted Rat

The addicted rat, Rattus
norvegicus demonicus, is a
subspecies of the common brown rat, Rattus norvegicus.
The common brown rat had been used in scientific experiments for over
a century, and in the course of those experiments, a number of
strains have been cultivated for one or more interesting traits. This
is also the case of the addicted rat.

The
addicted rat has been used mainly in labyrinth-experiments, where solving a puzzle or finding one's way through a maze is recompensed
by a treat, often in the form of food. To discover the extent of the
cognitive capabilities of rodents, scientists selected the best
performers, and made them do more and more complicated tasks for
their reward.

At
first, it was believed that the strain thus selected would have
higher intelligence than the average brown rat. However, subsequent
trials have proven that this is not the case. The addicted rat is in
no way intellectually superior to the brown rat. It is, however, much
more susceptible to addiction, and thus, has a much stronger drive to
solve a puzzle or reach the end of a maze. However, whenever there is
no reward to be obtained, the addicted rat performs significantly
lower on cognitive tests than a common brown rat.

In
1976, panic broke out in a laboratory in Oslo, as Gunnar Gunnerd
discovered that the whole population of addicted rats had managed to
escape their cages. Scientists feared that the animal would upset the
balance of the local ecosystem, and, due their ease with puzzles and
mazes, would be very hard to catch.

As
it turned out, the whole population was found one hour later in a
storage room where the rewards for the lab animals where kept. Given
that the door was locked, and that no air duct was connected to the
room, it remains a mystery to this day just how the rats gained access to
the treats, or even how they managed to open their cages.

After
the episode, the animals were transferred to a safe room, and kept
under lock 24/7, to ensure they did not escape again. This
precaution, as it turned out, was unnecessary, since all the rats
died a few days later, as a consequence of the excessive
treat-consumption that had happened during their escape.

The
addicted rat fell into disgrace after the Oslo incident, and has been
avoided in laboratories ever since. However, Dr. Jensjens Gunnerd,
son of Gunnar Gunnerd, and part of a team of human ethology at the
Oslo Institute of Ethically Dubious Studies (OIEDS), has recently
started to breed them again, and hopes to find clues as to how humans
interact while observing their behavior. As far as Dr. Gunnerd is
concerned, “the only other species known to mankind that would show
this kind of self-destructive behavior is, well, mankind itself.”